The Real Mafia

By CATHY BOOTH

OCTOPUS

by Claire Sterling

Norton; 384 pages; $19.95

Italians call the Sicilian Mafia "the Octopus," and justly so. As investigative reporter Claire Sterling shows, its tentacles have branched from Palermo over the past 30 years to get a global stranglehold on the $100 billion heroin market -- and a major stake in the new cocaine trade. With billions in profits to launder annually, the Sicilian Mafia also ranks as the world's most profitable multinational, showing a return of 1,600% on its investment.

Octopus opens with a slapstick scene in New York City's Palace restaurant. A Sicilian Mafioso is trying to pass off stolen "Tiepido" and "Van Go" paintings and "Stradinoff" violins to an undercover agent with a recorder sewn into the crotch of his shorts. It was 1977, and the detective didn't know that he was talking to a key player in a drug network newly launched by the Sicilians.

Sterling's book is not as sprightly as Nicholas Pileggi's Wiseguy, but it is thoroughly researched, with details of drugs shipped in wigs, cows' bellies, and women's girdles. Sterling studied wiretap and court transcripts, then interviewed cops, judges, prosecutors and even Mafiosi. Her book shows how the failure of U.S. and Italian authorities to compare notes and settle turf disputes allowed the Sicilians to win the heroin war. While Washington focuses on the Medellin cocaine cartel, the Sicilians merrily push heroin Stateside and are opening up new cocaine channels to Europe -- both East and West. Their newest target? Says Sterling: the Soviet Union.